Inside The Pinstripes

Yet Another Yankees Shortstop Prospect Earns Promotion

­Trey Sweeney was called-up to Double-A Somerset on Tuesday. His promotion followed Anthony Volpe’s, whose own promotion followed Oswald Peraza’s.

Gary Phillips

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The Yankees promoted yet another top shortstop prospect on Tuesday, moving Trey Sweeney from High-A Hudson Valley to Double-A Somerset.

Sweeney, New York’s first-round pick in 2021, is considered the organization's sixth-best prospect, per MLB.com, after 133 professional games. The Eastern Illinois product spent the entire 2022 season with the Renegades prior to his promotion and hit .241/.350/.415 with 14 home runs, 51 RBI and 29 stolen bases.

The 22-year-old Sweeney started the season off slow and battled an injury, but slashed .303/.452/.500 over his final 18 games with Hudson Valley. His expected Patriots debut was postponed Tuesday night due to rain.

Sweeney became the latest Yankees shortstop prospect to earn a call-up, as Somerset had a vacancy after Anthony Volpe was promoted to Triple-A on Sept. 2. Volpe, the Yankees’ top prospect, moved up after Oswald Peraza, the team’s third-best farmhand, was promoted to the majors on Sept. 1 after big league rosters expanded.

The Yankees have a shortstop prospect assembly line of sorts going on, which brings about questions regarding each player’s future in the organization.

Queries concerning Peraza have been the most frequent of late, as he has only started two games since joining the Yankees, and one of those came at second base despite Isiah Kiner-Falefa’s struggles. The Yankees were reluctant to trade Peraza, 22, despite their young shortstop surplus, but they also haven’t had him supplant a stopgap, which is all Kiner-Falefa was supposed to be.

Volpe feels like the heir apparent at short, even if that hasn’t been explicitly stated. The 21-year-old has gotten off to a hot start at Triple-A and could force himself into the major league equation next spring.

Sweeney, meanwhile, could become a candidate for a position switch if he stays with the Yankees, a possibility that was raised when he was drafted. He has exclusively played shortstop as a pro, but he picked up experience at third and second at Eastern Illinois and in the Prospect League, a collegiate summer league.

With three shortstops among their top 10 prospects, the Yankees are in a solid spot at the position moving forward – on paper anyway. New York chose not to sign a high-priced free agent last offseason, and Peraza is already in the majors with Volpe not far behind. Sweeney, meanwhile, is just two levels away.

With that trio on-hand, the Yankees have significant organizational depth, some valuable trade chips, and a few players athletic enough to play other positions. It’s just a matter of when they make a long-term commitment at shortstop, and who they make it to.

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Gary Phillips
GARY PHILLIPS

A graduate of Seton Hall, Gary Phillips has written and/or edited for The Athletic, The New York Times, Sporting News, USA Today Sports’ Jets Wire, Bleacher Report and Yankees Magazine, among others. He can be reached at garyhphillips@outlook.com.

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